


Always Gold

by elijahking (orphan_account)



Series: Neutralization [2]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Backstory, Brotherly Relationship, No Romance, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Papyrus, Some Fluff, Undertale Spoilers, You might cry, and I am sorry, headcanons, that might change though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-03
Updated: 2015-11-03
Packaged: 2018-04-29 17:44:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5136887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/elijahking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You would kill for me<br/>And knew that I'd do the same<br/>And it cut me sharp<br/>Hearing you'd gone away</p>
<p>But everything goes away<br/>Yeah everything goes away</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always Gold

**Author's Note:**

> here we go. inspired by a post i saw on tumblr, i don't remember who posted it- it had a photoset of papyrus talking about sans pranking frisk across space and time and how papyrus knows about all the timelines and yeah whoever made that, this goes out to you, and if you see this, let yourself be known. i wanna give you a fist bump for such a cool thing anyway  
> this is a continuation sort of of Heart Heavy, but not really for this first chapter. i'm sorry for all the confusion aaaa
> 
> this first chapter is really long so i'm kinda sorry i just kept having ideas
> 
> also, if any of you are following me on tumblr because of my fics, let me know so i can personally thank you

....  
It... was really quiet without him around, you know.  
It was snowing again. The lights melted everything around them, no matter how hard it fell. The silence was kinda crazy. Almost like everything was dead. But I knew in the morning the trees would talk again.  
I half expected Sans to be snoozing on the couch, but he was gone again. That was the other half I expected.  
...  
It... was really lonely without him around.

I get it. A guy needs his space. But he wasn't always like this. I can't even... remember how many 'timelines' ago he was the brother I'd always known and loved. The Sans who would crack bad puns and I'd groan at them, even though I secretly found them funny. But now it... was all an act. Sans, you still haven't re-calibrated your puzzles. All you do is sit there and boondoggle all day. Is that a human? Oh, well that takes care of everything. I can't work in this environment.  
It wasn't always like this... me, knowing. There was once a time when I really just thought I had a bad case of deja-vu. I don't really understand any of the science behind it; that was Sans's area of expertise. But I did understand this: things were repeating themselves. Over and over. I kept it up, going along with his bad jokes, building puzzles, and... dying. A lot. By this point, it was just a weird itch in my ribcages, but the first dozen or so times, it hurt pretty badly.  
It wasn't always like this... him, not.. being himself. He still made the jokes, but there was no effort. No love. For someone with a permanent smile, he was pretty unhappy. He always acted like he knew what was going to happen next, but he held certain things back.

But still, I tried. I tried so hard to get the human to not hurt anyone. Maybe a few puzzles would help. Maybe a little bit of love would encourage them. A whole lot of maybes and what-ifs. What if I try this differently? If I say something a little bit differently, in a different tone? What if I change this puzzle? What if? Maybe.

A lot of it didn't matter. I knew what would happen. I could feel myself dissolving into dust before the human. But I was determined. I'm still determined. I've seen their good side. I've heard their laugh, their TRUE laugh. I've seen a smile spread across their face, shining bright, as they held up a hand to me; their two middle fingers curled in and the others pointed out. Even I knew enough basic sign to understand that. _I love you._

I practiced that sign over and over, now the curling of my fingers just became a habit. Thinking of Sans. I love you. Thinking of Undyne. I love you. Thinking of everyone in Snowdin. I love you. Asgore. Toriel. Alphys. Mettaton. I love you, you, and you. Human. Frisk. I love you. And it's because I love you that I keep doing this. Sans is the pessimistic type, but me? I still hold onto my hopes and dreams, and I still try.

It was almost time. The snow had slowed falling, and the sounds of Snowdin waking up were filtering into the house. I took a deep breath, and putting on my Tuesday pretty okay face, I shouted up the stairs:

"SANS, YOU LAZYBONES! JUST HOW LONG DO YOU PLAN ON SLEEPING?!"

* * *

 

When did I find out?

That's... actually a pretty good question. 

I guess some people might call me a bad brother for going into Sans's room so often. But it was _messy_ , and I had to clean it up! He was smart to leave it locked to keep it from my cleaning hands (Woshuwa may or may not have been involved a few points in time), but sometimes... he just... left it unlocked. And he always leaves his socks laying around, so, me, being the good brother I am and helping fix Sans's personal hygiene, I would put them away. What does a skeleton who only wears house slippers do with all of those socks anyway? The answer to this question eluded me for many years.

Lo and behold, I find a key in one of his sock drawers. It didn't look like any key I had ever seen. I'd say it looked like a skeleton key, but I knew that Sans would lecture me on how that was misapplying the use of the term to any antique key, and also, it'd be a pun, and puns are illegal. Anyway, the key was black and had teeth on it that looked almost like buildings or fingers or.. something. Like they were always changing shape. I tried it on every lock I could possibly conceive, from our house, to the garage, Undyne's house, every door in the capital, even that weird door in the forest that some people thought was a secret entrance to the Ruins. But... I got a lot of nothing from that.

I was pacing around the house, thinking of any place I might have missed. I pocketed the key and decided, instead, to do some chores, maybe to get my mind off of it. Dishes. Vacuuming. Laundry. Garbage. Go outside, round to the back of the house where the garbage cans were. Drop inside, turn around, then realize:

Was that door always there?

It was almost seamless against the rest of the house. There wasn't even a knob to it, just a single key hole. I shoved the garbage cans aside, fumbled for the key, and stuck it in. A soft click came from inside as I turned it. Wow! Puzzle solved! I, of course, had to investigate what was  _inside_. It pushed open very easily and silently. If I could feel temperature, I probably would have described the room as cold, but of course, I could not, but it gave off that vibe. Blue tiles sprawled out on the floor and smelled like bleach and... static electricity. Metallic, burning, but... distant. Everything felt a little out of place. Like I wasn't supposed to be there. But ever the adventurer, I stepped further inwards, the door closing behind me and echoing through the small, hallway-esque room. On the far end was something covered in a sheet. I would explore that last, I thought to myself.

First came the series of drawers. Notebooks, various scientific papers, a lot of mumbo jumbo I didn't understand. A lot of handwriting I couldn't read. Some I recognized as Sans's, but it was numbers and notes and detailed graphs and I probably needed a doctorates just to hold them. I took one that was just full of notes from Sans and tucked it into my armor. Drawer number two held... a photo album. The first twenty pages just chronologging what looked to be some weird experiments, the building of a machine, and then... Some pictures of a man in a lab coat. He looked so... familiar. But every time I my eyes wandered away from his face, I forgot what he looked like. But when I stared directly at it, it brought up some... strange feelings in me. Feelings like... a welcome home hug, and wanting to be read to before bedtime. Feelings that were more memories than feelings.

It gave me a headache, so I put it away without looking any further. Next was the shelf above the drawers, which had a few blueprints on it, written in the same strange handwriting that... was a bunch of symbols? I couldn't figure out what the blueprint was for, even... Some kind of weapon? A machine? I shrugged it off and turned my attention to the sheet-covered object. I rose a hand to pull the sheet off, but when I touched the fabric, I felt... wrong, broken, almost. Like this object was more taboo than the room it was in. How I had never known about this room in the first place was beyond me. I had grown up in this house. This room felt like it didn't actually exist, stuck in a pocket of space that someone created just for it.

I exited the room, locking the door up again, replacing the garbage cans, and returning the key to the sock drawer in which I found it, pretending like I had never found it in the first place.

 I couldn't pretend entirely that I hadn't found it; after all, the edges of the notebook rattled against my ribs inside my armor. I went into my bedroom, closed the door, and as casual as I would with any other book, flopped down onto my bed and cracked it open to a random page.

* * *

 

_i sent the report to alphys, as usual. i know she won't get back to me on it any time soon, but it makes me feel better knowing she has the data._

_it's been probably eight... no, nine timelines, in my experience, since the human first fell. they haven't gotten very far yet. they'll get to somewhere in waterfall, i think, and then it'll all start over again. some have been better than others. the first time i saw them, they were so... murderous. i was hoping it was just my imagination, but that changed when they killed papyrus._

_i can't let that happen again, but they keep giving up before i can face them. one of the timelines, they were really cute and fun to hang out with. they even laughed at my puns._

_there's no inbetween, though. they either kill everything or they're super nice and don't harm anyone. this gives me little hope, because so far, it's been 2:7, nice:merciless._

_***_

_...been a couple dozen more since then. i'm so tired of seeing papyrus die. but he tries so hard, so hard for all of us. but it's gonna keep getting him killed._

_2:38, nice:merciless._

_***_

_they got so, so close this time. they were so delightfully kind and full of life. i could breathe easy for the first time in many timelines. but... right before they were going to break the barrier..._

_...it all started over._

_3:58_

_***_

_everything is blurring together now._

_3:126_

_...it's like they enjoy killing things_

_***_

_i've lost count. i've given up hope._

_i have to decimate them._

* * *

 

I felt so... betrayed. My own brother, keeping this from me... I know, I know you're protective, Sans, but I... I could have helped. All those moments of deja-vu, all those times when I thought I knew what was going to happen next... Well, I could only hope I didn't forget the next time they 'reset'.

And, I did, but only for a little while, until I saw them again and the memories came flooding back. But I still tried my best, for them, for my brother, because, the taste of freedom was so close.

And they, Frisk, were so close. Again. They were really struggling. I saw it, I knew. What was inside of them wasn't them. I wanted to do everything I can to help, be their friend and ally.

I placed my hand on their messy, bloodied hair, stroking and flattening it out. They were breathing slow, scared, eyes darting between me and the floor.

"They were just trying to be good. They fought so hard for it. They were really trying to remember who they were... not who they were forced to be."


End file.
